Awakenings
by Rex Amundi
Summary: This is the start of a new fanfic about the robots seen on the series. Please R&R i need acceptance.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters I portray here, and everything else that goes with it.   


Chapter 1: Awakenings

At 22:16:34 the inhabitants of Sunnydale felt a tremor, it was only small, such is the definition of a tremor, a mere 3.3 on the Richter Scale. Some of the residents probably mistook it for a truck passing by, it didn't have any affect on anyone, the authorities hadn't even bothered to tell anyone it was coming.   
22:16:37, a loose shelf in a basement in the centre of town finally gave in. The contents of the shelf, a bowling ball and a lot of biro's fell off. The bowling ball rolled along, minding it's own business when something came up from the floor and hit it. From the perspective of the thing that got hit, it was all gravities fault.   
April's head was the recipient of the rather nasty strike, if she'd have been human it would have probably killed her, crushing her skull and letting her brain soak into the concrete floor. But she wasn't human, she just looked like one. Her lifeless body began to stir to life, the backup battery cells in her skull, designed to keep a low voltage pumping into her CPU to retain memories, switched on after so much time. Her arms reached up and she pulled the dusty blanket from her head. God she was tired, she could barely move her arms, every inch of her was slowing down. The last thing she remembered was being talked to by someone as her power slowly ran down. Conversing with a woman who made her stop, and think of what she had been doing earlier. If only she could remember that now, her memories were pretty much gone, the spare cells hadn't worked.   
22:17:04, April realised her batteries were running down fast, she only had a minute or two of power left before she would return to lifelessness, condemned to be a realistic mannequin for the rest of time, she couldn't let that happen. Warren needed her. She scanned the dark room, her irises opened fully, letting in as much light as possible. In the corner of the room was a circuit box, with a collection of wires sticking out of the top. She threw the blanket to the floor and, trembling, walked over to the panel. She yanked it open and looked at the breakers. She checked her batteries, thirty seconds remaining. Without overthinking it she stuck her fingers into the palm of her left hand, and tore the synthetic flesh away. On the top it looked like real flesh, indistinguishable form the original thing, but underneath it was a light green hue. Her tactile sensors registered the sensation, but she didn't feel pain as quantitive as humans. With the metal skeleton and wiring exposed on her left hand she pressed it against a wire. Before her hand even touched it, it arced to her in a bright white flash.   
22:17:41, she lay with her back on the cold concrete floor, inert as she had been mere moments before. But this time was different. Her power circuits had been partially recharged by the shock and her systems came too full activation. She felt the strength return to her body, an electric tingle of hope. April's conscience which constitued the machine was no more than a sophisticated program which intergrated all of the sensory input and devised a move to make on that data. It could be talking, walking or even watching Frasier, it didn't matter, it was all the same, just a collection of Ones and Zeroes that did what they were told to do. But as a result of the shock she'd lost ninety per cent of everything that you could call April, her memories hadn't been properly insulated from the electricity. The mind left behind was different, it had somehow combined all the responses into a single program, an intelligent program. Her personality traits had been poured into the mix and stirred about, by all definitions of life, April was now sentient, able to make descisions based upon what she wanted, not what she was programmed to do.   
That was the great stumbling block for Warren. He could design the bodies and build them, but when it came to creating a personality that would actually choose what it wanted to do he was stumped. He was no where close to AI, hell, not even MIT with a budget of millions of dollars a year was close to that. Yet here, in a basement in Sunnydale, an accident had created it. Frankenstein life, a body given a mind by a lightning bolt.   
As she lay there she pondered the mysteries of her personal universe. Having your memory wiped was not a good thing if you wanted to know what you were, what you are meant to be. April thought about that, according to the scraps of data left, the memories she could reconstruct, she was an android. Full technical details of herself, her circuitry, her servomechanisms, even the chemical composition of her synthetic flesh were included. She got to her feet, her purple dress was torn and burnt, party by the electricity, party by the years of disregard. With her sensors cranked up to maximum perception she scanned the room she was in. Like a normal person had five senses, April have only three sensor systems that aped them. Her sight was provided by two optical cameras, her hearing was two microphones that used the shape of the ear as a collector, and her skin was full of tactile sensors that provided feedback on touch. Warren had not given her smell or taste, she needed neither, being a robot, and Warren was working out of his basement, all costs needed to be weighed against the potential return. No matter how much her liked April, he wasn't going to rush out and buy a set of olfactory apparatus just so she was complete, not when they needed to be invented first.   
In the corner of the dark, dusty room was a worktable. On it was another blanket, the contours of it matched the design of a human, perhaps one was asleep down there. She walked over to it, avoiding years of clutter and pulled back the dirty grey blanket. On the table was another android, its arms and legs had been ripped off but placed where they should go, to provide a skeleton like picture of what the person should have looked like. April leant over the body and stared at the head. Internally she was running a check against her identity database, a collection of pictures and notes on people Warren had programmed her to recognize. Like all her other memories it was fractured and she didn't get a match. She took the descision to start a new database and this young woman was the first to go into it, identified as just Android #001.   
She picked up one of the legs and looked at the broken end. The wiring and skeletal frame was a carbon-copy of her own, sophisticated, design. Under the skin was the tactile sensors, connected to the central 'bone' by thin wires in flexible plastic, alongside the sensors was the heating elements, designed to give the skin a temperature akin to normal. In the centre was a single rod of hollow steel which contained all the wires leading to and from the computer system in the skull and chest. A few credit-card sized processors were buried in the leg, they gave the limb the dexterity it needed without having to run a cable as thick as an arm to carry the responses, an artificial autonomic reflex nervous system.   
One thing April noticed about all of the damage was that it must've took a hell of a lot of force to rend her limb from limb. The androids weren't designed to be pushovers, she must've been hit by a truck. She found smaller injuries akin to bruises around the entire body, areas where the tactile sensors had been broken. The thought occured to her, what was she going to do with a quadropolegic robot. The answer, simple. She could learn from her, about the nature of herself, about who built her, it was enough to spur her into action.   
April thought she may have had to go upstairs, and into the unknown, but all the bits and pieces she needed to repair her were with her in the basement. Televisions, amps, Hi-Fi's, all stuff Xander had put down there when his basement was full. She tore out panels and surgically removed circuitry and gubbins, carefully using them to rebuild Android #001. The most difficult part of the operation was resculpting the skin so it blended together at the reattached sections.   
03:11:54, April stepped back and basked in the glory of her work. She'd successfully remade a android, one like her. She pulled the wire from the prone robots belly button which was recharging her, and pressed the switch at the base of her neck. For a moment nothing happened, then her eyes opened and refocused to the dark. She sat up in one straight motion, her hair flicked forward. She moved her head from left to right, surveying her surroundings, then she turned to face April.   
'Hello,' she said. 'I'm Buffy. Who are you?'   
She was no longer the anonymous Android #001, she had a name, and it was Buffy? Strangely reminiscent to April. 'Hello, I'm April.'   
'Nice to meet you,' came the chirpy reply. 'Do you know where I can find the Scooby Gang. Spike's my favourite.'   
'No, I have no idea where the Scooby Gang is. Can you answer some questions for me?'   
'I always help as best I can, that's what Willow programmed me to do.'   
April had been stupid, to think that this android would be anything like her. She was endlessly happy, with no character, and she referred to her programmer. 'Did Willow make you?' she queried.   
'No, silly. Willow is just my friend. Warren is my maker.'   
Warren, somehow April thought the person who'd made her to have a sensible name. Warren, that made him sound like a rabbit. It was just stupid. 'Do you know where he lives?'   
'No,' said Buffy. 'I was just built by him. I now live with my little sister Dawn, Willow and her friend Tara.'   
'That is interesting,' sighed April. 'Who put you down here?'   
'I'm not sure.'   
'What is the last thing you remember?'   
'Oh, I was fighting the big bad. Some very nasty demons who tore me apart.'   
'They tore you apart,' echoed April. 'Don't you feel angry?' There had been no anger in her voice, just a ceaseless love of life. Willow must've been a sadist.   
'I can't feel anything, I'm not real.'   
April watched as Buffy got off the table and stood upright, she was smaller than her by a few centimetres. She began to walk over to the staircase when April trotted up behind her and pulled out the panel in the small of her back. When it was closed, it sat flush, impossible to see.   
'Stop it,' said Buffy. 'That tickles.' Then she died on her feet. A reserve battery in her head kept her memories alive, she was never intended to be fully off, just powered down to recharge.   
April picked her up easily and placed her down on the table again, after brushing aside a mess of discarded parts. She stuck a cable into Buffy's USB port and connected it to her own port. April's mind intruded into Buffy's mind and they mingled together. Gradually she drew out all of her data, all of her personnel files and slotted them into her own storage memory. As the last bit of data transfered to her April began to reprogram Buffy. Buffy's personality was based upon the real Buffy Summers, a vampire slayer, whatever that is. She altered the flow of information, imparted a small gift, part of herself, her cognitive intelligent program. As Buffy lay on the table she was brought to true life, not a cruel mockery to be used as a sex-toy by Spike, but an individual being, independent as April was.   
The next time Buffy stepped off the table she was alive. She pulled her hair back and held it in place with a hairband. The two robots eyed each other up, wondering what they were going to do next. 


	2. Chapter 2

'Got him, I think,' said Buffy. She was sitting in a plastic chair, a cable ran from her neck to a phone line next to her. Her mind was set free in the internet, beautiful and flawless, she'd searched through every database she could to find information on Warren Spiller, her maker.  
  
'Where's 'bout, Buff,' asked April. She was flicking through a copy of the Arcane Daemon which she'd found on a shelf. The Magic Shop had lots of supernatural-related wares, most of it in excellent condition.  
  
'Northram Defence,' Buffy replied. 'It's a military contractor. They have a Warren Spiller listed as an employee.'  
  
'Good, that's where we should go.' April closed her book on the Akrashi Demon page, then set it down on the dusty countertop.  
  
'No, wait. The information about where he lives isn't here, it's listed as being on a stand-alone network in their Nevada site.'  
  
'Why is that?'  
  
'It's ultra-confedential. Top-secret data.'  
  
April lent over the counter and opened the till, it still had a small amount of money in it. April speed-counted it, one hundred and two dollars. 'I think we'd better get going then.'  
  
Both robots had decided upon their present course of action a few minutes ago. They were searching out their maker, a sort of demi-religious task. Neither of them knew what to do when they found him, they might just feel right being near him, they didn't know. Heaven knowns the information about Warren in Buffy's database was an excuse for a bad picture. April had known, but her memory was shot to pieces, replaced by an eighteen point five gigabyte sentient program.  
  
They did, however, have one faultering start, the lack of hard cash. One hundred and two dollars wasn't that much, so they combined their minds and flooded into the California National Bank. They swept aside all guardians programs and created money. They didn't steal the money, they just straight up created it, it was only electronic digits. Bits with an attitiude. They were AI's and as such they were computers, able to outperform anything on the virtual battlefield. They siphoned the money into an account in a numbered Swiss Bank and then shut the link down, the whole process took less than a minute.  
  
The duo of robotic ladies took an bus trip to Nevada, first class, of course. When they got there they rented a labratory out at Nevada Technical Institute, there they could analyze and improve their construction with up- to-date technologies. The fact that it was 2006 wasn't really anything or consequence to them, losing six years would've made a biological human scream for the years to return, but Buffy and April were quite possibly immortal.  
  
April hacked her way into the Northram Central Mainframe in the evening. She got round their slow moving guardian programs and went into the security technology. Her virtual soul sucked up the data, apparently they used the exact same, state-of-the-art sensors in every location they had.  
  
'Shit,' said April as she went over the security arrangements. 'They've got sensors up the Yangtze. Motion, thermal, acoustic, there's no way we'll be able to sneak in there.'  
  
'Then there's something else, another way we can get in.'  
  
'We can't break in, but maybe we can walk in.'  
  
'Hmm, I don't see where you're going.'  
  
'We could docter some records and make an ID for one of us to sneak in. Well, I say one of us, I mean you.'  
  
'Why me?' asked Buffy.  
  
'Simple, Buff. You're based on a real person, to the specifications of Buffy Summers. The sensors inside the building have DNA recognizing technology, you'd need to be human to get in.'  
  
'Or at least appear to be human.'  
  
'Right.'  
  
'It should be possible, using modern-day technology, to clone enough of Buffy Summers for me to wear her skin like a suit. It's possible, they developed various cell cloning three years ago.'  
  
'But where are we going to find the cells to begin with?'  
  
It took three days before the old Summer's residence relinqueshed it's prize. It was inside a flute Buffy had tried to play two years ago. They took it to the lab and began the ominous work of cloning the cells to produce an layer of flesh. But they soon found it wasn't enough. Not only did they have to clone the flesh, they also had to feed it, which meant it needed blood, and a support system to produce the nutrients needed.  
  
It took a few days to clone enough flesh to cover Buffy's entire body. The two robots worked like experts to remove the entire artificial skin and put in the required organic components. It took two weeks to complete the total transformation, in which time both of them read as much as they could, absorbing data like water.  
  
When they were finished, a stubble had started to appear on Buffy's head, her hair had started to grow. They couldn't wait until it was long enough to keep suspiction down, so they attached her old hair to her skull. Buffy went out and bought the fabrics she needed to make an army uniform, she worked for hours to perfect it. Then they were ready.  
  
When she walked up to the main gate she got herself into character. Buffy was dressed in a Lieutenants uniform, her hair was pulled into a ponytail which sat nicely under her hat. She was the personal secretary of Major Clarke who was working on a top-secret project, a US military/Northram joint venture to develop an antigravity device. She had a holdall under her arm, and a ID card in her jacket pocket with the name Claire Klienstock on it. Earlier on April had hacked into the Northram database and entered Lieutenant Claire N Klienstock on their authorised personnel list, with a level three clearance, if they knew anything well, it was computers. The gate was a three metre high affair topped with razor wire. A guard box was too the left of it, Buffy walked confidently up to it. A number of guards were inside, they all had black uniforms with the Northram insignia on the lapels. One of them, a burly six footer, was sitting at the desk behind armoured glass. She pressed a buzzer down and got his attention. 'I'm Lieutenant Klienstock, Major Clarkes aide.' she said.  
  
'Let me see the ID,' said the guard. He obviously knew who Major Clarke was.  
  
Buffy pulled it out of her pocket and placed it in the steel tray. The guard pulled it back and lifted it up, he ran it under a laser, which checked the barcode on the front, just over her picture and details. A red light on the machine switched to green. 'Please go to the reception area,' said the guard, 'there you will recieve your card and be directed to Major Clarke.' He slid the tray back and Buffy took her false ID.  
  
As the gate slid across, one of the guards said: 'I wouldn't mind her as my personal aide.' The remark was met with rauscous laughter.  
  
She walked up the two hundred metre drive aware that electronic eyes were observing her. Cameras mounted on poles kept up with her, tracking her movements. Along with the guards own eyes. The drive was a simple concrete road, perfectly straight, which led up to the reception. She pushed the glass door open and walked up to the wooden desk. Behind it was a receptionist wearing a headset and cleaning her fingernails with a biro. Another set of cameras were inside, silently observing her. The receptionist didn't even look up. 'Sign the book,' she said.  
  
Buffy signed the book, her signature was a perfect copy of Claire Klienstocks. She looked down the list of names, Major M Clarke, was logged in at eight forty two that morning. The receptionist typed something out onto her keyboard and the machine next to her spurted out a card. She handed it to Buffy. On the car was a picture of her, her name, ID number and the Northram logo.  
  
'Clip it to your jacket,' said the Receptionist. 'Never take it off. When you leave please place it in one of our garbage receptacles where it will be incinerated.'  
  
'You don't take any chanced do you,' commented Buffy.  
  
'If you had over nine billion dollars worth of research here, you wouldn't either. Major Clarke is in the Greenwich Labratory, follow the directions on the wall. Please don't divert from them, security tends to get a little heavy handed. There are several checkpoints on the way, don't worry, they're just for your protection.'  
  
'Thank you.' Buffy walked to the double doors that led into the centre, armoured glass ports set in solid steel. Someone's very paranoid. At the side of the door was a terminal, Buffy swiped her card and the doors opened, very fast and very quiet for something so big. She stepped forward onto the grey carpet, on either side of her were doors, but no windows whatsoever. She came to the first corner, a large plaque on the wall had the different sections and lab marked in various colours. Greenwich was a dark olive, it pointed right so she continued on her way.  
  
The blueprints for the compound were locked away on a government computer somewhere even the robots couldn't get to. So Buffy had to use her crystal-clear mind to find the stand-alone terminal she needed. She decided to follow the way to Greenwich Lab until something availed itself, a risky move, as Major Clarke wouldn't recognise her. Then she reached her next obstacle, a barrier which needed a genetic sample to pass. She pressed her hand down onto the mounted panel and felt a small pin prick her, a drop of blood left her body and the device ran a genetest. After two seconds the light flashed green, the door's lock clicked open and she went through, deeper into the maze.  
  
Two more similar barriers barred her way, each she passed through with effacy, her confiidence grew, she may actually do this. As she rounded a corner into a small foyer, she saw a man in uniform standing in front of a drinks machine, he pressed the button and a Pepsi dropped down into the part at the bottom. As Buffy got closer she recognised the Major rank on his eppaulettes, she immediately snapped to attention.  
  
The action of her shoes snapping together caught the attention of the military man, as her turned to face her she saw name Major Clarke printed clearly on his ID card which was attached to his light green jacket. He raised his arm and said: 'Stand at ease, lieutenant.'  
  
'Thank you, sir,' Buffy replied.  
  
'Good morning,' he said. 'I haven't seen you here before.'  
  
'No, sir. I have just arrived, I am reporting to Captain Tanner.'  
  
'Ah, Bill. How's he doing on that project of his.'  
  
Buffy was worried, she had read Captain Tanner's name from the register, but she had no idea why he was there. 'Proceeding nicely, sir. Captain Tanner believes a working prototype will be ready by June.' Stupid, stupid, stupid, thought Buffy. Why did you have to go and tack that cheesy line on the end, it could blow the whole operation down the drain. What if Bill's working on a totally radical thing, something so impractical he'd reported it'd take decades to make and advacnes, stupid!  
  
'Good to hear it, I always knew Bill was smart as a barrel of monkeys. See you in the commassary.'  
  
'Yes, sir.' Phew, that was almost it, game over. She had a choice of two doors, one led to the Greenwich Lab, the other to the Goldman Lab. Now, Major Clarke was working in the Greenwich Lab, so she had to get throught the other door. But her card was only cleared for her way to the antigravity project, damn. She stood by the Goldman Lab and took out her ID card, she quickly substituted it for a tiny modem mounted on a credit card sized piece of plastic. It shouldn't arouse any suspiction. She pressed it into the terminal, the computers almost alerted security, but Buffy's mind connected to it via the modem, she pressed the security alert back and searched for the clearance. Time was getting on, Clarke was watching her, she could feel it. If it went red, he'd go for the button to his right, the alarm. Unless, she might be able to overpower him, no that was stupid.  
  
Ten seconds passed before she was allowed access. She went through as quickly as possible and closed the door after her, she lent back on the door for support. In front of her was a short corridor, a door at the end had a big glass panel in it, she could see a white room beyond, the lab. To her right was another door, she opened it up and stepped inside. It was an office, someones office. Papers lay around the desk, and neast to them was a computer terminal. She sat down and started it up. The screen went black, two words came up. User Name, and Password. She typed in the access she'd lifted and went in. The Northram system was easy to use, it was idiot proof, despite the fact it was only supposed to be used by the best and brightest. She got into the personnel files and typed in Spiller, Warren. A single hyperlink came up, she clicked on it and went straight to Warren's file. It was a level four clearance thing, so she had to burn through the security, risky as Northram supposedly had top-notch guardian programs running.  
  
Name: Warren Spiller  
  
Reference Number 134-4-879  
  
Clearance Level: Five  
  
Assignment: ECHO Project  
  
Recruitment Date: 14/4/03  
  
Current Status: On Leave  
  
DOB: 25/6/78  
  
Address: 18 Falstaff Avenue, Brunswick Industrial Park, Los Angeles  
  
Was that right? Did Warren live in an Industrial Park, why would he ever do that. She dug deeper, into his career history. He'd been on leave officially for the past year, and had taken considerable time off before then. His work for Northram had been revolutionary, so they didn't care about his erratic habits. She logged in further and accessed the files for the ECHO project. Her eyes were glued to the screen, terryfying stuff.  
  
Buffy made it out of the building as quick as possible. As she walked out of the gate she squirted the code to April and a car pulled out at the front. It was a steel grey Mercedes, stolen from some rich guy. April had left a note with the exact instructions upon how to recover it at the Bus Depot. She didn't like stealing, but it was important. Buffy changed into her civilian clothes as April drove them to the Bus Depot. They took a connecting ride to Los Angeles. 


	3. Chapter 3

'Is this the address?' asked April.  
  
'Yup, eighteen Falstaff Avenue, Brunswick Industrial Park. This is it.'  
  
April pressed the button on the right of the double doors, the glass was frosted. Five seconds later a video camera on a boom swung over and peered at them, the front door opened, it led to a lobby with a couple of easy chairs on the side and a Rembrandt on the wall, a single intercom was mounted on a pole sticking out of the ground. Another set of double doors, solid steel, were set four metres from the last ones. 'Hello,' came a voice from the intercom. 'Can I help you?'  
  
'Yeah,' said April. 'We're here to see Warren Spiller.'  
  
'Really?' came the reply. 'He's a very busy man, there's only one chance you can see him.'  
  
'What's that?'  
  
'If you can pass through the rooms that lead to him. Beware, they're nasty.'  
  
Buffy and April huddled and talked to themselves for a moment, eventually they stopped and faced the intercom. 'Okay, we're coming through,' said April. She pressed the two doors in front of her open, they led to a long, thin room, seven metres long and three metres wide. It appeared just to be a corridor, the two of them set off down it. In an instant the double doors behind them snapped shut, they heard the crunch of an electronic lock. Then the main part of the corridor floor fell away, revealing a six metre drop with sharp spikes at the bottom, a single beam, a few centimetres across was the only way to get to the other side.  
  
'What is this?' questioned Buffy.  
  
'It's a test,' came Warren's reply. 'If you can get across to the other side, without dying, you can progress. Please, don't try the doors, a steel shutter has closed behind it, there's only one way out now. Well two, but death isn't an option, is it.'  
  
'Is this a joke?'  
  
'Dear me, no. Almost everyone gets through here, only a couple didn't.'  
  
'People have died here?' asked April angrily.  
  
'Not many, not in this room, it's easy. By the way, I'll be shooting general knowledge questions at you the whole time. Get one wrong and it's bye-bye bridge, now get moving.'  
  
April took a step onto the beam, it gave slightly under her weight. She took another step and it gave again, not much though, a millimetre or two. April's gyro-stabilizer shifted her weight accordingly, when she reached the middle she was pretty confident.  
  
'What's the speed of light?' asked Warren.  
  
'One hundred and eighty six thousand miles a second,' replied April.  
  
Good. Who led his men into a defeat againt against the Indians at Little Bighorn?'  
  
'Custer, of course,' said April. Then she had reached the other end of the bridge, Buffy began to cross.  
  
'Who was the first man on the moon?'  
  
'Neil Armstrong, in the late nineteen sixties,' replied a confident Buffy. She'd absorbed a hell of a lot of data in the last few days, general knowledge was a sinch to her.  
  
'Who made the first powered flight?'  
  
'The Wright Brothers,' replied Buffy. Then she reached the other end of the room, the white door opened up, it was similar to a hatch on submarines. The pair of robots went through. 'Look, this is rediculous. Let us see you, that's all we want.'  
  
'You can only see me if you survive, okay?'  
  
'This is insane,' said April. 'You're insane, you can't do this.'  
  
'You're inside, I control everything here, you can't leave. And I'm blocking all transmissions if you think a cell phone would work.'  
  
The next room was connected with a small corridor, April and Buffy had to hunch up to pass through. The next room was similar to the last, it's floor had a pattern though.  
  
'Good job you went through on your own,' said the electronic Warren. 'If you hadn't I'd have had to start flooding it with a nerve gas. A real nasty one, heard of VX?'  
  
'How many tried to stop there then?' asked Buffy. 'All of them I'd guess after they saw what a wacko you were.'  
  
'You're funny, you should be a stand-up comic,' replied Warren. His voice came from a speaker embedded in the wall and covered with a layer of plastic. 'Actually a few have died there, they couldn't face what was coming.'  
  
'And what is that?'  
  
'Glad you asked. The floor has several hidden panels, stepping on one with send a five hundred volt charge through the entire floor. If you fail to identify certain piece of music a five hundred volt charge will go through despite your stepping, gottit?'  
  
'Yeah,' said April. 'You sick piece of shit, when I get to you I'm gonna rip your spinal cord our and use it as a banjo.'  
  
'So you have an incentive to win, good. I like those who play, make it more interesting.'  
  
As April took a step forward, a piece of music came up, her aural sensors checked certain notations and patterns against a huge database of music. 'Linkin Park,' she said. 'Crawlin'. They were pretty good until the lead singer killed himself.'  
  
'Hey, he was murdered by the Government and you know it.'  
  
'Why would the Government kill him?'  
  
'They were testing a new weapon, a device which imprints suicidal thought patterns on the brain via a laser paradigm. They used the highest profile person they could find and tested it, those bastards. I should know, I was once part of the Military-Industrial Complex.'  
  
'We know,' said Buffy. 'You worked for Northram, designing a new military application android, deep-cover. Wired with explosives, it could walk right up to Saddam and explode.'  
  
'How'd you know that?' growled Warren.  
  
'We'll tell you when we see you, face to face.' As Buffy stepped forward, another piece of music came through. 'The Who. Who are you.'  
  
A few metres into the room, and a ripple of electricity coursed across their synthetic bodies. 'What're you standing on?' asked April.  
  
Buffy looked down at her feet, 'It looks like a semi-quaver. Over there, its a quaver.'  
  
'Is that is Warren?' said April to the room. 'Is it musical notes? That's so lame.'  
  
Warren gave them several piece of contempary and classical music. Between the pair of them they identified each and everyone. They got to the end of the room with no more fuss. This time there were two submarine hatches, both exactly the same in size and shape. 'Pick one,' said Warren. 'One's easy, the others one hell of a bitch.'  
  
April grabbed the handle of the left one and yanked it open. She heard metal scraping against metal on the side of the right door, probably some kind of device to stop her opening the other one. Warren must've though of everything. How the hell much time did he log in designing and building this killing machine. April pulled her hand against a piece of the wall, it was cold, and most likely as thick as all get out. No chance of tearing through it and ripping that smug bastards head off.  
  
Buffy and April stopped in the next crampt corridor for a moment. 'He hasn't recognised us,' said April.  
  
'Yeah, if you were the first one her built, he should.'  
  
'I bet he's really mentally unstable. Possibly a schizophrenic, two personalities or more in one body.'  
  
'Keep moving ladies, my fingers on the VX trigger.'  
  
The next room was a square, with simple white walls. It was four metres wide and long, and about two point five high. Set in the end of the room was two speakers, and to the right of them two buttons. Warren didn;t explain the setup, as they walked closer the left speaker came on. 'One of us always lies, one of us can't help but to tell the truth. You may ask either of us two yes or no questions.' The voice was an electric construct, a digital speaker, Warren was just an observer here. 'One of the buttons on that panel opens the door, the other sends a spray of hydrochloric acid into this room. You have ninety seconds, then the acid will spray down automatically, starting now.'  
  
'I'm starting to dislike him,' said April.  
  
'This is a simple logic problem,' said Buffy. 'All we have to do is ask the one on the right which button is safe. If he lies it'll be the wrong one, if he tells the truth it'll be the correct one. Then we ask the other one which is safe, he'll say . . .'  
  
'Exactly the opposite one, despite his alliegence,' finished April. 'We'll be at square one, we wouldn't know which to believe.'  
  
'Sixty seconds remaining,' reminded the voice.  
  
'Okay,' started April. 'Left guy, is the Earth a perfect sphere?'  
  
'Of course,' it replied.  
  
'Rightie, which button is safe?'  
  
'The one on your left.'  
  
April went over to the panel and pressed the one on the right, the door slid open.  
  
'Clever,' said Warren. 'Most people get caught in up in overthinking that time runs out.'  
  
'It's just good logic,' replied April. 'The Earth isn't a perfect sphere, its flat at the poles.'  
  
The next room was a dimly lit affair. In the centre was a table, with a puzzle on it. The pieces were scattered about the table, some one the right side, some on the wrong. The box on the table said it was a two hundred piece puzzle with a picture of the Marble Arch on it.  
  
'It can't be that simple,' said Buffy.  
  
'It isn't,' said Warren. 'This room is essentially a large microwave oven. I will raise the temperature two degrees every minute until you finish. I will also ask you questions, they have a ten second time-limit. Get one wrong or if you're timed out, it's an instant three degree raise. Got it?'  
  
April and Buffy got over to the puzzle quickly, they turned over the pieces as fast as possible. But despite their reflexes, they were just as fast as a very fast perosn, so Warren suspected nothing. The two robots glanced at the box and took a snapshot of the image, they then checked every piece they got about it and put it in its correct position.  
  
'What is the third largest continent?'  
  
'North America,' Buffy shot back.  
  
'What is the percentage of land it has?'  
  
'Sixteen point three,' she replied.  
  
'You're good. Right, who was the eight President of the USA?'  
  
'Martin Van Buren.'  
  
Buffy thought that Warren may just get annoyed and crank the temperature up to three hundred anyway. But what he'd said earlier made her believe he'd be fair, in the context of his game. He wouldn't kill them unless they violated a rule or were outrightly incorrect. She checked the air temperature, it was still a mild twenty six degrees. The floor beneath her feet was a roasting thirty. Warren shot questions, and between them they got them right.  
  
In nine minutes the two of them had completed the puzzle. They got all the questions right, the temperature was thirty six degree celsius, a human would begin to faint from heath exhaustion. How any person could get past this room was beyond April.  
  
Buffy's flesh was real, cloned from the original Buffy Summers. It functioned exactly like anyone else's skin. Sweat beads dripped across her body, her clothes were almost soaking in it, especially her blue top, which had huge prints on her armpits and down the front. At sixty degrees both of them would start to go bad, their processors and memory would begin to fry, and Buffy's skin would start burning. They could sustain a maximum of one hundred and twenty, by then April artificial skin would drip off her like wax and they would cease to function. Their backups would keep them ticking over to two hundred, where their processors and memory would burn up. All that would be left would be two steel skeletons.  
  
Buffy felt the temperature drop to a comfortable level. There were two doors in the wall, April swung open the right one and passed through, Buffy followed.  
  
April dropped down half a metre and found herself in ankle deep water. It was clear as crystal. She took a handful to her mouth and swallowed it, it was fresh water. April's internal systems had been modified, she could use the water to cool her computers down. When Warren built her she would've fried herself, another reason Warren didn't suspect what they were.  
  
Buffy dropped down too, she went to her knees and splashed the water across her face to cool her flesh down. Her clothes were soaked with cool liquid and they clung tightly to her sculptured body. She took a mouthful of it and it went down to her biorganic internal organs. Part cloned organ, part machine. She needed it to keep her circulatory system going, to keep her skin alive. She could easily function without it, but she'd grown fond of a covering that could feel, that responded, that was alive.  
  
'This is the water chamber,' said Warren. The room was smaller than the rest, its was a rectangle, about the length and width of a car, but two metres high. Apart from the ankle-deep water on the bottom it was empty. 'It will start to fill with water in a moment, but first I'll explain. You must answer me correctly, when I ask you the capitals of various Countries, or American states. Do you know your geography?'  
  
'Yeah,' said April. 'We're about ten metres from your ass. Population: my foot.'  
  
'Here goes, get ten right to stop the water and leave.' Three panels in the ceiling slid over, the three pipes they covered started to rain heavily. It spat down onto the two figures. The water level began to rise.  
  
'What's the capital of Utah?'  
  
'Easy, it's Salt Lake City,' replied Buffy as she spat a mouthful of water out.  
  
'That was easy, your starter for ten if you like. Capital of Nepal? Remember, one wrong answer and it'll just fill up, no more games.'  
  
'I though as much, said April. 'You're the kind of sick puppy who would do that. The answers Kathmandu.'  
  
The water had reached the tops of their shins. Buffy was standing in a corner, her hands pressed against the walls. April was standing upright, her hands touching the ceiling.  
  
'Capital of Nigeria?'  
  
'Abuja,' answered Buffy. She'd absorbed most of the knowledge about Geography. They also got right South Africa, Niger, Bhutan, Botswana, Alaska and Liberia, then it came to the last one.  
  
'Okay, I have an easy one for you. What's the capital of Florida?'  
  
The water was up to their chins, their bodies floated in the small pool as they searched for an answer. 'What is is?' asked Buffy, trying to hurry her pal along.  
  
'What do you mean, what is it? You're the geography expert, you should know!'  
  
'I don't. I don't know why, but I don't.'  
  
'Shit. Think, what's in Florida?'  
  
Buffy brought up a exact map of Florida, it hung in the air in front of her, a digital display. She took another breath, the air was rapidly getting carbon dioxided, Buffy needed to respirate in order to keep her flesh alive. She had an air tank inside of her, pure oxygen, could last for thirty minutes if necessary. April had nothing like that, she was pure machine. She'd function in water just as well as on land. 'Miami!' Buffy said. 'It has to be Miami.'  
  
'Is that your final answer?' asked Warren. His voice was unclear through the pour of water as it pumped into the chamber.  
  
Buffy wasn't just a machine, if she was she either knew it or didn't. She didn't. But she wasn't a machine, she was alive, so she guessed. 'Tallahassee,' she screamed.  
  
A hatch at the bottom of the water opened. The water level in the chamber was just enough so they could have their heads above it, gasping for oxygen so it seemed. Buffy held her breath and sent under, her hair flipped about in the water, and she grabbed two handles just beneath the hidden door. As she pulled herself down she could see that the whole section was flooded. That was why the water level in the tank didn't change, they were the same pressure. More handles were in the wall and she used them to drag her body through. Eventually, she emerged from the depths, she grabbed another series of handles and hauled herself out of the water. Her hair was plastered across her face, she swept it back. Drops started to drizzle off her onto the steel floor. A moment later April appeared, she swept her hair back and they stopped for a second.  
  
'Why did you guess Tallahassee, Buff? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad you did, but why not Miami like you said earlier?'  
  
'I've heard something about Florida before. Something about the biggest city not being the capital, that it was in the north. I checked my map, which doesn't even have the capital marked off, and I chose Tallahassee. We were lucky, it was between that and Jacksonville.'  
  
'Move along,' said Warren. 'Nothing to see. Except maybe swirls of green VX gas.'  
  
'Y'know, he's starting to piss me off.' April was angry, she thought about staying put and him watching as he saw the nerve gas had no effect, what would he do then, wet himself?  
  
'C'mon,' said Buffy as she opened the hatch. 'I've ran a position match. The building is only a hundred metres long, and we've gone across eight five of it. He's close, I can feel it.'  
  
Each room was different, thought April. The one they went into had ridges along the floor and ceiling. It was also small, just bigger than the water chamber.  
  
'You're further than anyone's ever been,' said Warren.  
  
'I'm so proud,' joked Buffy.  
  
'You should be. According to my calculations, you two are in the top point one per cent of this nations people. Smart and beautiful, not a bad combination.'  
  
'I won't be so attractive when I'm tearing your throat out with my teeth,' said April.  
  
'If you can get to me. Right I'd better start this one up.' April and Buffy heard hums coming from the floor and ceiling, then they started to close together, slowly, but inexorably. Even the two robots couldn't survive a car press. 'You have to name all seven dwarves in reverse alphabetical order. Anything at all, any utterance will be taken as an answer, so think about it in your head first. I estimated you'll be dead in eighty seconds.'  
  
They both started to recall the data about Snow White. April looked over to Buffy, she was mouthing something. April ran her lip-reading program. 'You do it,' Buffy mouthed.  
  
April stood up, something hard to do when the she could feel the top of it against her head. Was that it, she thought. After the horrible inquisitions he wants seven names form a fairy tale? 'Sneezy, Sleepy, Happy, Grumpy, Dopey, Doc and Bashful.' She paused a moment. 'Now no more games, let us see you. We deserved it, you murdering sadist!' The press kept going down, then it stopped. April and Buffy were on their knees, their strength was pressing against it. But that wouldn't have helped, it was too powerful. Warren had stopped it.  
  
'Yes,' he replied. 'That's the last of my games, the final challenge. It didn't throw you.' The ceiling and floor retracted to their former positions. When a dull thud signifed they were locked in place another hatch opened, it led to another cubic room that was three metres to a side. On the other side was an open doorway, beyond it stood Warren. Older, crazier, he had a beard, but it was him. 'Y'know most people blurted it out to quickly, they got them mixed up.' This time is wasn't through a speaker, he was there, a few metres in front of them.  
  
'You said we got the furthest, further than anyone else,' said Buffy.  
  
'You did. I took a clipboard out into LA one time, asked them to do basically what I asked of you. Only three percent got it right. You really are two remarkable young women, do you know that?'  
  
He went onto the streets to test a question, thought Buffy. What lengths was this psycho willing to go to, to perfect his death machine. When they got into the steel room the door in front of them slammed shut, the one behind did at the same time, they were trapped. 'Look you little shit,' said April. 'You said there were no more games.'  
  
Warren placed his headset back on, 'That's true, this is no game. It's just death, straight up without ice. The vent in the middle of the room is drawing the air away, you'll starve of oxygen soon.'  
  
Buffy surged forward, her shoulder slammed into the steel door in front of her, a small dent appeared. Hwe fingers searched about the rim, trying to find something to get purchase on, but it was slick. April kicked as hard as she could, another dent appeared, it was a centimetre deep at most.  
  
'That's solid steel,' said Warren. 'What are you, you certainly ain't human, and that would explain how you bested my Death Maze.'  
  
'Tell us one thing before we die,' asked Buffy. 'How many have entered and never got out?'  
  
'About three dozen,' Warren said calmly.  
  
'Bastard!' screamed April. She kicked again and again, more dents, but no progress. As an android she didn't need air, but Warren probably had more tricks in this room, it was the final layer between him and reality. Perhaps sulphuric acid would pour down, like a summer rain.  
  
'Let us out and we'll tell you what we are,' said Buffy. 'Kill us and you've got nothing.'  
  
Warren pondered it, the air grew ever thinner. Buffy took a deep breath, half an hour. Then the exit door opened, as Buffy passed under it, she saw it was twenty centimetres thick, a proper, no messing, door. The control room, from where Warren watched and spoke, was a circular room, it had computer panels all around it. Yellow marks ran down the surfaces and words such as water chamber were written on them. A control board.  
  
'What are you?' asked Warren. He was sitting in a comfortable chair, black leather, real nifty.  
  
Water still ran from their clothing, their shoes squelched as they walked. 'I am the first android you built,' said April.  
  
'And I was one constructed for sex,' said Buffy. 'As you can see we've grown over the past few years.'  
  
'Ah, yes,' said Warren. 'Now I remember, you're August?'  
  
'April,' she corrected. 'Why did you built this awful thing?'  
  
'Because I could,' replied Warren. 'Why do you think I built you.'  
  
'You're a sadistic asshole,' said April through gritted teeth. 'Which I am going to enjoy tearing in two. No one else will die here.'  
  
'You came all this way to kill me?'  
  
'No, we came to talk,' said Buffy. 'But you're obviously deranged.'  
  
'I have rights.'  
  
'No you don't. You forfeighted them when you build this piece of shit.'  
  
'Oh, okay. Well then lets see what I do have shall we? Death Maze, check. Millions of dollars from Government grants into my research, check. The latest in robotic bodyguards, check.'  
  
'What was the last one?' asked April.  
  
'Just the most sophisticated robot I've ever designed and built, the next generation from you.' Warren pressed a button on the console in front of him and a panel slid back to reveal a cupboard. Inside was a robotic bodyguard designed to look like a vampire. 'Compared to him, you're toasters with an ego.'  
  
April and Buffy split up, they edged around it, then its eyes lit up, a sunset orange. It walked forward with a masculin stride. It was dressed in bikers leathers. At the end of each finger was a blade a centimetre long. Both androids brought their combat training forward, they were like seasoned professionals. Warren span his chair around to watch the fight like he was at a boxing match. He pressed his hands together. 'Let's get ready to rumble.'  
  
The robotic vampire was one metre ninety, he towered over the two small women. He turned to face Buffy-bot first, his hand shot out and clasped around her neck, his vice grip started to crush her throat. Both of Buffy's arms grabbed the hand strangeling her, she tried to force it apart, to break free, but his grip was total. It was at that point April roundhouse kicked him in the face, he shrugged it off and his face changed. The jaw went down a few centimetres and the cheeks went out, a small nozzle came forward. He turned to face April and a jet of viscous fluid shot out. April ducked under it, she glanced over and saw it eating its way through a keyboard. She would've told Warren vampires didn't spit acid, but I don't think he would care much.  
  
Buffy punched the vampire in the face and kicked him in the breadbasket, she must've hit something vital because he let her go, his hand stayed open. Buffy got in close and landed more punches, bits of him flew over the place, then as she was going to strike him again, his hand came up and closed around her fist. She heard the crackle of electricity and the breaking of metal, blood dripped from the vampires hold, then he let go. Buffy examined the appendage, it was crushed beyond repair.  
  
April jumped onto his back, she brought her elbow down on his shoulder, he didn't flinch, he just stretched one arm back impossibly far and grabbed her dress. He threw her across the room and she crashed into a table which had magazines and coffee on it. He turned his attention back to Buffy-bot, he grabbed her easily, despite her kicking and thrashing and got her in a bear hug. His mighty arms closed around her, they began to crack her skeleton, which was a form of aluminium. Her tactile sensors flicked off one by one as they were overloaded. She hurridly tried to think of something. She saw Aprils hands press against the vampires head. Her servos strained to apply that much force without breaking. His cranial plate began to crack, just as Buffy thought she was going to die, the grip relaxed, the vampire-bot fell to the ground. His head had been crushed. And Warren had put the main processors in there. The body twitched then died down, the two robots faced Warren, who was still sitting there.  
  
'It wasn't my fault,' he sobbed. 'It was the demon, he made me crazy, please, you have to believe me.'  
  
'Sorry, Warren,' said April. 'No tricks.'  
  
He looked up at her, his eyes were crying blood, it ran down his face and off his chin. He turned the chair around, and pulled open a hidden drawer. 'It wasn't my fault,' he said as he pressed the muzzle of a pistol to his temple. 'You can't blame me.' Then he pulled the trigger. His brain splattered across the consoles and he slumped in his chair. His hand went limp and the gun fell to the floor.  
  
'I believe him,' said Buffy.  
  
'You'd like to believe him you mean, it's in your personailty.'  
  
'No, that's not it. As a Scooby Gang member I read several books on demons. Some of them drive their victim insane and feed off the terror they sow.'  
  
'You think one got to Warren?'  
  
'Yes. His genius could built this Death Maze, but a rational, sane Warren would never have done it, probably. But a whacked out Warren would have no compunctions.'  
  
'Let's call the police then go,' said April. They searched for a way out, they found a button that opened another hidden door. It led down into a cellar beneath and maze. There they found a workshop and a whole mess of robots, they duplicated some of LA's best-known people. The Mayor, Police Chief, Civil Servant, the terror he could've sowed with a whole City under his thumb. Buffy and April destroyed the robots, but kept pieces of their hardware for themselves. 


End file.
